This should be an interesting read, and I definitely will read it when it comes out. One thing I love to read are memoirs of music stars. I find that stuff entertaining and addicting for some reason. I think the reason I like to read that stuff so much is that, I want to know what it’s like to be a rock star.
Cissy Houston’s book is set for a Feb. 2013 release date, by Harper Collins.
More on the story, here.
Kev
This week I finished two different books. Reading has always been one of my favorite hobbies for years ’cause reading is good for you. It’s good for your mind and helps get your mind off things. It’s what I like to do when I am completely bored and want to relax. When I’m not working out or playing guitar, reading is what I’ll do. Here’s the two books I finished reading this week, with a brief review:
“The Wind Through the Keyhole” by Stephen King: I am the biggest Stephen King fan ever. I have collected most of his books over the years, and if you look at my bookshelf sometime, half of it is full of Stephen King books on hardcover, it is sometimes hard to collect all Stephen King books ’cause he’s always releasing a new book all the time. On with the book, “The Wind Through the Keyhole” is a Dark Tower novel. The story takes place between Book IV and V. It tells the story of Roland ka-tet group, which includes, Susannah, Eddie, Jake and Oy, arriving at a river on their journey to the Dark Tower. An elderly man who operates a ferry warns them that a dangerous storm called Starkblast is coming, and they must find shelter for safety. So the ka-tet groups hides in the shelter while waiting for the storm to go by. While waiting for the storm to go by, Roland decides to tell his group a story about his past, where he and his friend goes to the town of Debaria to hunt down a man called, The Skin Man. The second story is about a boy named Tim Ross, who he must meet someone by the name of the Covenant Man, a tax collector.
I couldn’t put this book down. It’s not very long, a little over 300 pages, pretty short. I finished in just two or three days. Not like those 900-1000 pages long which Stephen is mostly known to writing that number of pages mostly. This novel stays away from the regular Dark Tower adventure and focuses on something completely different. The story will keep you guessing and hooked to the end. It’ll remind you of those children’s fairytale books even though this book is aimed for adult readers. This is just a fill in for in between Dark Tower novels, and it’s just proof that Stephen can keep the “Dark Tower” series going if he wanted. Could the Dark Tower series be the next big franchise when these start getting made into movies? Could they easily top, Harry Potter or Twilight? Maybe not with the younger audience, but the Dark Tower movies and TV series WILL be huge for adult fans. “The Wind Through the Keyhole” was pretty unique storytelling. You gotta wonder how Stephen comes up with these crazy stories. The guy has a strange imagination for sure, which is why I love his writing so much. He’s not afraid to tell stories how he wants them to be told.
“The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets Nest” – I finally gotten around to reading the final Lisbeth Salander story, the Millennium series. This novel was pretty addicting as well. It leaves off from, “The Girl Who Played With Fire”, the second novel. In this book, it’s about trying to prove Lisbeth innocent and make her a free woman because of her troubled past. She was wrongfully sent to a mental hospital as a teen and Blomkvist tries to help her to get her freedom back.
The book gets even more shocking than the last one. Of course, this book was hard to put down and I went right through it. The book reveals more shocking things about Lisbeth’s life. This book is less violent than the last two, but still this is a good conclusion and ended wonderfully. I love the Lisbeth Salander character. She’s so inspiring and almost makes you wish that she was a real person. You feel bad for her a lot too. She’s an honest character. After reading the three Lisbeth books makes me wish Stieg Larrson was still alive to write a fourth one.
I bought two more books from Ipad, Ibooks store, Dee Snider’s rock memoir, “Shut up and Give Me the Mic” and “50 Shades of Grey”. I’m not into romance novels too much, but I had to get “50 Shades of Grey” since the reviews says this book is pretty hot and steamy, an erotica story. Just got it out of curiosity and couldn’t resist that one.
Kev
Pete Townshend and the Who, announced the release date for his memoir titled, “Who I Am”, set to release Oct. 8th in US, and Oct. 11th in the UK.
The book will focus on everything about Pete’s life. It will focus on his music career and his personal life outside of music. All of it.
More on the story, here.
I’m very excited for this book. Why? Because I am a huge fan of Pete Townshend and the Who. I’ve been a long time fan of the Who. I’m a fan of Pete’s solo career as well. The guy is a musical genius, love him or hate him.
I know Pete is accused of being a pedophile by many, but I think that is pretty much one of the reasons for this book. He wants people to understand him better in a more positive direction.
Plus, more importantly, I’m more interested in reading about Pete’s musical career. I want to know how he ended up joining the Who. How he came up with smashing guitars and doing that spin wheel arm thing he does on stage, when he plays the guitar. I want to learn more insight about the Who’s career as well. I want to know more about his obsession with guitars and stuff.
No matter what you think of Pete and no matter what happens to him legally, he will always be a rock n’ roll legend. That won’t change.
The Who were one of the greatest rock n’ roll bands on the planet, I fuckin’ loved them and still do. I’ll be getting this book for sure.
Kev
I’ve finally started reading the “Walking Dead” books. Just read the first two, “Days Gone By” and “Miles Behind Us”. While the stories of the TV show and books can be similar, both are pretty different too! The TV show left a lot out from the books, changed some characters, left some characters out, and changed the story around too.
Here’s how different it is from the books:
– Shane dies even sooner. In the book, Carl kills Shane while Shane was still alive. Shane didn’t turn.
– Carol doesn’t have the buzz cut like she does in the show. In the books, she has long blonde hair. I always wondered why on the show, she has the buzz cut hair do? Cancer survivor maybe? Not sure.
– Dale and Andrea were lovers, but on the show they weren’t.
– T-Dog (Tyrese) steals the show in the books, while he gets lesser TV time in the show.
– Sophia doesn’t go missing in book 2. Instead she goes to Hershel’s home with the family and she ends up falling in love with Carl, this wasn’t in the show, they took it out.
– Hershel confronts Maggie and Glenn for having sex, but in the show, he doesn’t.
– Donna and Allen were characters not in the TV show.
– No Merle and Daryl Dixon.
– There was none of that CDC stuff at the end of book 1.
– They don’t keep the Walkers in the barn top secret. In book 2, Hershel tells Rick about it first.
That’s it. You pretty much get the idea. I can understand why the “Walking Dead” TV show gets mixed reviews ’cause it’s so different than the books. No wonder people complain about the show a lot! They left a lot of important stuff from the books that weren’t in the TV show at all.
Glad I started reading the books. I’ll start reading book 3, “Safety Behind Bars”, tomorrow.
Kev
J.K. Rowling’s publisher, Little Brown & Co. has revealed plot details of her next book aimed at adult readers. The title is, “The Casual Vacancy”, and the plot will stay far away from the wizard stuff. Totally different!
The story will be taken place in the UK in a town called, Pagford. Taken from the article, “It opens with the sudden death of a popular man whose unexpected demise shocks the town, which is described as far more menacing than its pretty facade would indicate.
The publisher said that in reality Pagford is “a town at war” with rich people fighting the poor, parents battling their teenagers, and wives in conflict with their husbands.”
The book will be getting released, Sept. 27th.
More on the story, here.
Very cool, looking forward to reading it. We’ll see how well it sells with it not being Harry Potter and all. Do you think she can still be a successful writer, even if she’s done with Harry Potter? We’ll have to wait and see what happens. If the book doesn’t sell well and it fails, oh well. She made tons of money with the Harry Potter franchise, so I’m sure she’s no longer worried about being a best selling author anymore. She continues to write ’cause that is what she does and I’m sure she doesn’t want to write Harry Potter for the rest of her life. Writers have to write different things.
Kev
Today, I just finished reading the rock memoir, “Commando”, by Johnny Ramone. He was the rhythm guitarist for the punk rock band, The Ramones. I must say that this is one of my favorite rock memoirs I’ve ever read. Johnny Ramone himself, really wrote this book himself before his death. He definitely did not have a ghost writer ’cause when you read this book it makes you feel like he’s actually talking to you.
This is also the most honest rock memoir I’ve ever read. Most rock memoirs would focus on the sex, drugs & music. Well, this book strictly focuses on the music. The book starts off from the day he was born and goes all the way up to his death.
Johnny was a true punk. He knew what punk was all about and he will tell everything about living the punk lifestyle. Part of being a punk is being angry and having a short temper, all the time. Having the not give a fuck attitude. Johnny was really honest in this book. He won’t be afraid to tell you what was good or what was bad. He will also tell you who he got along with and who he didn’t get along with.
If you think Johnny and Joey Ramone were best friends, think again! Johnny said in the book, that he and Joey hated each other guts. They never got along at all. It was Dee Dee, the bass player, who Johnny got along with the most than everyone.
Johnny also wrote in the book that he never intended to be in a rock n’ roll band to begin with. He was going to focus on being a construction worker and just live a normal life. Other people begged him to become a rocker, so he picked up the guitar, learned to play and formed the Ramones.
Johnny talked about how he wanted the band to be at their best ever, and he wanted to have success. He talked about how the Ramones struggled at first by playing a bunch of shows at CBGB’s in NYC (the club where the Ramones first got their start). Did you think Johnny and Debra Harry of Blondie got along? They didn’t get along at first but they became friends later. Johnny was never the one to become friends with other musicians. He wanted to be friends with normal people. Until the Ramones got even more famous later on, Johnny started becoming friends with other famous musicians such as Eddie Vedder, Chris Cornell, Lisa Marie Presley, Kirk Hammett, etc.
When you see Ramones concerts, do you ever wonder why their sets are always so short and why their songs are so short? It’s because Johnny wanted it that way. He never liked long songs and he didn’t care for guitar solos, even if he did think that Jimi Hendrix was one of his favorite musicians.
Of course, toward the end of this book, when it got to the cancer stuff, that’s when the book got really sad. The book is full of rare and never before seen photos, and all kinds of things. It’s a short book. So it’s an easy & quick read. It only took a couple of days to read.
I’m a pretty big Ramones fan. I don’t own any of their music but I’m going to start collecting their stuff soon, but I have been listening to them for years, though. Heard their stuff on the radio, and listen to them in youtube. While I still think the Clash is my no. 1 favorite punk band, the Ramones would have to be my 2nd favorite. They were an incredible band and it’s a shame that most of the members died.
This book is recommended for all music lovers or Ramones fans. This book will help make you understand them better. They may have been underrated back then, but they are greatly appreciated now!
Kev
This week, I finally finished reading the book, “1Q84”, on the Ipad for IBooks.
Here’s the plot: The year is 1984 and the city is Tokyo.
A young woman named Aomame follows a taxi driver’s enigmatic suggestion and begins to notice puzzling discrepancies in the world around her. She has entered, she realizes, a parallel existence, which she calls 1Q84 —“Q is for ‘question mark.’ A world that bears a question.” Meanwhile, an aspiring writer named Tengo takes on a suspect ghostwriting project. He becomes so wrapped up with the work and its unusual author that, soon, his previously placid life begins to come unraveled.
As Aomame’s and Tengo’s narratives converge over the course of this single year, we learn of the profound and tangled connections that bind them ever closer: a beautiful, dyslexic teenage girl with a unique vision; a mysterious religious cult that instigated a shoot-out with the metropolitan police; a reclusive, wealthy dowager who runs a shelter for abused women; a hideously ugly private investigator; a mild-mannered yet ruthlessly efficient bodyguard; and a peculiarly insistent television-fee collector.
A love story, a mystery, a fantasy, a novel of self-discovery, a dystopia to rival George Orwell’s—1Q84 is Haruki Murakami’s most ambitious undertaking yet: an instant best seller in his native Japan, and a tremendous feat of imagination from one of our most revered contemporary writers.
I’ve never read, Haruki’s books before. After reading this one, it makes me want to read more of his work if his earlier work are English translated. This guy is a famous writer from Japan, but most of his books are published in the USA in English versions, I believe. The reason I wanted to read this book ’cause the book was creating a lot of buzz on the internet lately, so I got interested in reading it. The story sounded interesting, and when I look at the cover of this book, that’s another reason that would make you want to buy it. The cover of this novel looks pretty cool doesn’t it?
This book took me forever to read but I read the whole thing. It’s almost a thousand pages long, but on the Ipad it’s over: 2,000 pages.
I’ll tell you right now that this story was very addicting. I couldn’t put it down ever since I started it. The book was pretty masterful storytelling. While it is mostly a fantasy story, it has pretty much a little bit of everything in it for everyone. It’s also a romance novel but some of it can get pretty graphic and violent. It can get also get pretty sexual too.
I really loved the story between, Tengo & Aomame. How they kept them apart for most of the book, keeping their story a mystery. The chapters of the book switches back and forth from Tengo to Aomame. The characters seem pretty realistic and they are enjoyable throughout the story. Even the villains in the story can be enjoyable too (yes, there are badguys).
I think “1Q84”, could make a good movie if they did it, right, and it wouldn’t surprise me if Hollywood is planning one soon. While the book is pretty long, it is fast pacing and easy to read. Another reason, that made me want to read it is that I have a big interest in Chinese culture. This is a good book, if you’re looking for something different and unique to read.
Kev
Ever since author, J.K. Rowling, finished writing the Harry Potter series, she hasn’t released a new novel since. It’s been 5 years since she hasn’t released a new book. That’s okay for her, ’cause she doesn’t need to release books as much anymore. She have made a fortune out of the Harry Potter books and I’m pretty sure she gets paid for the movies, that includes payments from the Harry Potter theme parks at both Universal Studios. She’s an extremely rich woman that she doesn’t need to write anymore if she doesn’t want to. I guess, she is continuing to write ’cause writing is her passion.
She has signed a book deal with Little, Brown publishing company to release her next book in the U.S. and the U.K. This will be her first novel for adult readers only and her focus in the novel could be away from magic and Wizards that she’s known for. It’s going to be a different genre even if details haven’t been released yet.
Read the full story, here.
What genre is the next book going to be? Since it’s going to be an adult story, not for children. It might be a romance novel, that might be pretty racy and sexual. Or it could be a horror novel or mystery, something like that.
I can definitely see it being away from Fantasy novels ’cause she’s done the Fantasy thing for so long with Harry Potter. I can’t blame her for wanting to do something different finally. It’ll be interesting to see what she has in store for us, and I’ll be looking forward to this book, no matter what genre it is.
Kev
DC Comics recently announced the huge news that they plan on making a 7 part prequel series to Alan Moore’s hit graphic novel, “Watchmen”. Alan Moore, the creator of “Watchmen” himself is not happy with this and he wants this project to get stopped.
Read what Alan Moore have to say, here.
I’ve read, the “Watchmen” graphic novel, and it’s way better than the movie by Zack Snyder. I also agree that the prequels shouldn’t happen. They shouldn’t happen without Alan Moore being a part of it, at least.
Kev
8 years ago, Johnny Ramone, one of the guitarists for the legendary punk rock band, The Ramones, died of prostate cancer. Before his death, he wrote a memoir, but it was never published. Johnny’s wife/widow, recently announced, she will finally get the book published for him after all these years.
The book will be titled, “Commando: The Autobiography of Johnny Ramone”, will hit stores on, April 2nd. The book will only be a 176 pages long and it will be full of photos selected by Linda.
Read the full story, here.
As a huge Ramones fan, I’m definitely looking forward to this. Hopefully this will be available for Ibooks for the Ipad ’cause I won’t shop at Barnes & Noble too much anymore. I fuckin’ love the Ramones. “Hey ho, Lets go, hey ho, lets go”….
Kev
K'Brocking 
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